Boy brings gun to school to stop baby brother from finding it at home

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A 5-year-old kindergartner says he took a gun to school because he didn’t want his baby brother to play with it at home. (Getty)

When a 5-year-old Pennsylvania boy found a loaded gun on a bed inside his family’s apartment, he decided to stuff it in his school backpack because he feared his 3-year-old brother might find the .22-caliber revolver and hurt himself.

The boy, whose name hasn’t been released to media, forgot about the firearm in his backpack and on Monday morning he showed up with it at his elementary school in Aliquippa, a city northwest of Pittsburgh.

When a friend of the boy learned about the gun, he told a teacher who immediately called the police.

When police showed up at Aliquippa Elementary School, they secured the firearm and phoned the boy’s mother. Authorities are trying to determine whether to charge the mother and her boyfriend who live in the apartment with the two boys.

The school suspended the boy for one day, but, according to WPIX-TV, family friends feel the punishment is unnecessary because the boy’s intentions were good.

“He put it in his book bag and forgot it was in there… For them to say he’s aggressive, that’s a lie,” the boy’s godmother, Nicole Lutle, told WPIX-TV. “It’s not that this child was bad. It’s not that this child had a temper because all of that is a lie.

“He picked it up because he didn’t want his little brother to get to it. He knew his little brother wouldn’t go through his book bag, so he put it in his book bag and forgot it was in there.

“He’s a very sweet kid. He wasn’t taking the gun to school to hurt anyone,”

The school sent a note to parents on Tuesday alerting them of the incident, but many parents told WPIX that they wished they were contacted on the day of the event.

“That’s not good enough. We need to know when it happens,” Darryce McCoy said.

The gun was purchased in 1914 and is registered with a person who is now dead.